Davey's Great Idea
by agentmoppet
Summary: Summary: Quidditch League Season Four – Seeker (Wasps) – Prompt: Wasps: A Hogwarts portrait: Paint a grey castle. And that's not all: your story MUST also start and finish with the same word.


_**A/N:**_ _Quidditch League Season Four – Seeker (Wasps) – Prompt:_ ** _Wasps:_** _A Hogwarts portrait: Paint a grey castle. And that's not all:_ ** _your story MUST also start and finish with the same word._**

Davey Gudgeon squinted at the tiny piece of parchment, an idea slowly beginning to take root in his mind.

He ran his thumb over the drawing. It was a map of Hogwarts, but unlike any he had seen before. It was clearly a first draft, with tiny notes sketched into the margin, but the magic it was imbued with was astonishing. Tiny figures moved through the castle, little name bubbles following them where they stepped. He gasped, flinching away from the paper as his finger ran over his own name, right where he stood in this very corridor.

His eyes lit up – the possibilities this kind of magic could bring! Who had created it? What would they do with it? He looked up, but the corridor was empty. Someone had dropped it on their way through. Was it a student? Surely not.

But the handwriting was scrappy and irreverent, and didn't seem to match any teacher's writing he had seen on the black board. He folded the map into a tiny square and slid it into his pocket, hurrying away to the library. If he could develop this map into something better – something larger – then maybe, just maybe, they would finally notice him.

~oOo~

"You're in the library again?" Meredith Lain wrinkled her nose as she eyed him across the table.

"We've been looking for you all night. We're playing spin the bottle in the 'puffs change room. You coming?"

Davey shook his head. "I can't tonight. I have homework."

Meredith rolled her eyes. "Don't be an arse. You handed in three feet of _extra_ assignments to _Binns._ You could leave off homework for the rest of the year and still be ahead of the rest of us."

"I'm just busy, okay?" Davey snapped, leaning over his parchment and books further to make sure they were hidden.

He had finally found the right book – the one that held the secret to disembodied tracing charms – and Meredith was _interrupting._

Meredith made a loud sound of exasperation and left. Madam Pince glared at her as she flounced past the circulation desk, before turning her narrowed gaze on Davey. He was the last student there, and it was nearly time for curfew.

Just as she looked away, the sound of muffled giggles reached Davey's ears. He looked up in confusion, wondering why it sounded so nearby when there was no one in sight.

"Shut up, Prongs! You're going to get us caught."

"Padfoot, the pong of your feet is going to get us caught far quicker than any noise I make. Seriously, do you wash?"

"You smell like a dog," came the calm voice of a third person, before three sets of poorly-stifled laughter burst out.

Davey's eyes widened. He knew who it was – he had heard their nicknames so many times before. He sat up straight, looking around the library, unable to keep the eagre grin from his face. "Potter?" he hissed quietly. "Black? Is that you?"

There was a suspicious silence.

"It's alright," he whispered. "I won't rat on you. Are you under a disillusionment charm?"

After ten anxious minutes, Davey finally accepted that they must have gone. Frowning, he slowly packed up his things before Madam Pince could turn on him.

When he gave them the map – complete with every secret passage the castle contained – they would _have_ to notice him then.

He glanced down at his table and cried out in horror; the book was gone.

~oOo~

"Why won't it work?" Davey snapped, tearing the fifth revised map into pieces and throwing it away.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't get the hidden tunnels to appear in the design; it was as if there was a protection on them.

He stared at the tapestry on the wall, the one that hid the secret passage he had found one morning when he had tripped over a statue and fallen through the wall.

"Maybe if I use a piece of the tunnel _in_ the map," he mumbled, "which means it will need to be bigger. More of a portrait. But that's okay, it will work, I'm sure-"

He stepped forward confidently-

-and howled in pain as an invisible object burst through from behind the tapestry and sent him crashing into the armor behind him.

"Quick seal it up!"

The body-less voice came from somewhere near Davey's left ear, and he whipped around in astonishment. But, of course, there was no one there.

There was a loud explosion, and the tapestry fell from the wall, singed.

"We don't want Hagrid finding a hidden swimming pool!" Another voice agreed. "He'd put a bloody shark in it."

Davey barely noticed as the voices disappeared down the corridor – he stared, mouth gaping, at the wall opposite him. His beautiful secret was gone, covered by a smoking pile of rubble.

~oOo~

This was it, his last chance. It had to work. He had researched it thoroughly, and he knew that the properties of the Whomping Willow were strong enough to keep his map permanently linked to Time. That way, it could at least track the staircases, even if he had failed in properly tracking the people and mapping the only secret tunnel he knew.

He ran a hand through his hair, staring distantly at the Hogwarts grounds. Meredith had commented that he looked "sallow" and "pasty" yesterday. Davey thought that was a bit rude. He hoped the Marauders didn't notice when he gave them the map. He could picture it now – their wide gazes of astonishment, the way they would clap him on the back and praise his advanced magic skills. Maybe they'd even ruffle his hair, the way that Potter did to Black every two minutes.

Davey wiped the smile from his face and forced himself to think of the map, nearly finished, back in his dorm. He had decided on a large canvas that could be shrunk and carried around. The grey castle became see-through at a touch, revealing all the many stairs and corridors, and the people moving around them. They didn't have names, but that was alright. It was incredibly advanced magic, and anyone would be impressed.

He steeled himself, and took off for the Willow at a run. He dodged the first hit, ducking and rolling along the ground, and the second, but the third came at him from above. With a bellow, he was knocked across the grounds. In the distance, he thought he heard someone swear.

Through a haze of pain, he felt strong hands pick him up and carry him far away from the convulsing tree. He held his eye, too scared to check for blood and wondering if the numbness was a good thing or a bad thing.

"Padfoot, he's dead! We killed him! Our tree killed him!"

"Prongs, calm down, we weren't even there and he's not dead."

"He is dead! Look at his eyes. And it's our tree, and he was probably following us, and we've bloody killed him."

"Moony, give him some chocolate before I strangle him. Wormtail, is the kid alright?"

"I think so," a quavering voice came quite close to Davey's head. "He's just in shock."

"Well, I'd bloody think so. He took that hit like a champ. It's lucky we were just coming out of the-"

There was a loud thumping sound, followed by an oof, and then silence. Slowly, Davey sat up, feeling the shaking slowly subside. His mouth dropped open at the sight of the four boys in front of him, and he felt his cheeks begin to flush.

"I-I'm fine," he stammered.

Black grinned and reached forward to clap him on the back. "I told you – he's fine. He's a strong kid."

Davey's face lit up, and to his horror, he felt tears begin to prick his eyes – they had noticed him, and he didn't even need the map. It had probably been a stupid idea, anyway. Why would they need a map?

"What's your name?" Potter asked, smiling at him.

Davey felt as though his heart would burst. "Davey."


End file.
